David Mamet and the Deceptions of American Myths

by Andrew Schenker

Many people in today's society are plagued with feelings of inadequacy and confusion. Unable to face these feelings, they often choose instead to hide behind a series of lies. These lies soon come to take on the epic proportions of myths and begin to establish themselves in the form of common rituals. When these deceitful myths and rituals have come to be accepted as the truth, they begin to preclude any chance of fulfillment from the lives of their believers. Playwright and essayist David Mamet has devoted his artistic life to the study of these myths which he holds have "a tremendous capacity to destroy our lives" (Dean 55).

The myths that establish themselves in the minds of Mamet's characters, often
through the influence of the mass media, have turned them into victims of a corrupt
society. Mamet has often quoted the French writer Voltaire, saying, "words were
invented to hide feelings" (qtd. in Bigsby 48). Indeed, the language of his characters,
often noted for its strong obscenities, is Mamet's most effective device for revealing
this victimization, as the characters hide their insecurities behind the prescribed
myths of society (Hall 217).

David Mamet has said that his "sex life was ruined by the popular media" (Dean 55).
In order to illustrate how this could happen, he wrote the play Sexual Perversity in
Chicago. The two male characters in the play, Danny and Bernie, think of women
purely in sexual terms. Bernie, in particular, has taken on the persona of a swinging
womanizer, and teaches his sexist attitudes to his younger friend, Danny. Bernie
spends his time frequenting bars, looking for women, and bragging of made-up affairs
to Danny. Mamet shows us Bernie at work, trying to pick up a woman named Joan at a
bar. Bernie gives a false name and occupation for himself and comes on with a
smooth approach. After Joan rejects him, telling him that he is not "sexually
attractive" (16), Bernie continues to cling to his fantasy approach, an important part of
his act, and begins to insult Joan (Dean 74). Bernie is unable to understand the
workings of the female mind. He hides behind his super-stud approach, unable to
accept his numerous rejections. His rage at society for ruining his sex life, is instead
directed at women, as he formulates his derogatory attitude (Novick 360):

"The main thing, Dan... The main thing about broads... Is... The Way to Get Laid
is to Treat 'Em Like Shit (17)."

Mamet makes it clear where these damaging stereotypes come from. He pictures
Bernie in his apartment, watching T.V. at three o'clock in the morning. Although
Bernie is watching a religious ad, supposedly upholding sacred values, the ad speaks of
the common goal of "getting laid" and "moistening the old wick" (19).

Danny is surrounded daily by Bernie as the two file together at the office or get drunk at each other's apartments. It is impossible for Danny to avoid falling victim to
Bernie's destructive influence. Thus, Mamet shows how easy it is for someone who is
lucky enough to enter into a relationship, as Danny does with fellow Chicago-dweller
Deborah Solomon, to end up entirely unsatisfied. Danny has little idea how to carry
on a successful relationship. As Mamet suggests, he has been brainwashed by myths
about macho male sexuality. He tells Deborah he loves her because it is expected of
him; however, it is clear that the two share little love throughout their nine-week
relationship. Inevitably the relationship comes to an end, as Danny has nothing more
to say to Deborah than, "I love your breasts" (42). After the messy breakup, Danny
returns to hanging out with Bernie and dissecting the anatomy of various women. As
Mamet later noted, "men will waste their time in pursuit of the utterly useless simply
because their peers are all doing it" (Freaks 22). By the end of the play, Danny has
begun further to reflect Bernie's influence, adopting a directly abusive attitude towards
all women. The dialogue ends with Danny calling out to an imaginary woman at the
beach who has rejected him. "Deaf bitch," he yells (55).

Looking to extend his study of myths to other areas of society, Mamet next turned his social commentary to a study of the falsities which predominate in the business world. The result, his critically acclaimed play American Buffalo, concerns the exploits
of two vulgar, working-class citizens who plot to steal valuable coins and cut a third
partner out of the deal. Mamet intends his characters to be representative of
lower-class corporate employees (Gale 214). Mamet has said of the society satirized by
this play that it is a "society with only one bottom line: How much money you make"
(Carroll 32). The characters in the play serve as representatives of the human race,
struggling in order to survive against the falsehoods of the American myth
(MacNicholas 66). They still believe in the opportunity to improve their lot in the
world beyond where society has placed them and are prepared to set aside
their morals to achieve these results. They find easy justification for these actions
through the myths of business and competition. Mamet has said that "the ethics of the
business community is that you can be as predatory as you want within a structured
environment" (Carroll 33). Because they feel unfairly disadvantaged by society, the
play's characters hold that they are justified in using whatever methods are necessary
to improve their standing in the world. Only money is of importance to them. This
value system eventually causes them to turn on each other, as each tries to win a
bigger share for himself. By the end of the play, the characters have accomplished
nothing. The only significant actions in the play occur when one of the characters, in a
violent rage of frustration, destroys Don's junk shop, where the play takes place, and
seriously injures another character. Nothing is more American, though, than this
emphasis on free enterprise and personal gain, regardless of cost, as is made clear in a
key dialogue from the play:

Teach: You know what is free enterprise? The freedom...Of the Individual...To
Embark on Any Fucking Course that he sees fit...In order to secure his honest
chance to make a profit...The country's founded on this... (Buffalo 57-58).

Thus Teach represents what Mamet knows has become of American capitalism. "We excuse all sorts of great and small betrayals and ethical compromises called business," Mamet said (Gale 214). This is a theme he would continue to explore throughout his career.

By 1983, David Mamet had established himself as a talented and successful playwright. After meeting with much success, he decided to re-visit the themes of American Buffalo and come up with a further indictment of the American capitalist system. The result was the highly renowned play Glengarry Glen Ross. The play's characters, corrupt real-estate salesmen, are caught up in the rituals of their business. The salesmen are under heavy pressure to make sales in order to keep their jobs. Unseen bosses Mitch and Murray have issued the men a sales ultimatum, in which the top salesman wins a Cadillac and the bottom salesmen get fired. The dialogue of the characters, thoroughly vulgar, reveals clearly the frustration they are feeling: "What the fuck, what bus did you get off of, we're here to fucking sell," (Ross 19) salesmen Shelly Levene exclaims as he tries to make a plea with the office manager to secretly sell him some "leads." "Leads," referred to throughout the play, are the names of prospects provided to the salesmen. The men constantly compete with one another to get the best ones (Kaufman 30). Elsewhere in the play, more corrupt action occurs, as
two other salesmen plot to break into the building and steal a choice set of leads. Like
the crooks in American Buffalo, money is of primary importance to the characters in
Glengarry Glen Ross, as they throw themselves wholeheartedly into the ritual of
selling worthless real estate to unsuspecting customers. The interaction between the
characters is entirely devoid of sensitivity. The only time the play addresses such
topics as loneliness and romance is during part of a prefabricated sales pitch (Rich 220).
When Shelly Levene closes an unexpected deal towards the end of the play, he gets
caught up in the excitement, "recounting the crude ritual of a contract closing," as one
critic put it, "as if it were a grand religious rite" (Rich 220). As Levene reveals to a
fellow salesman how he tricked a family into buying some bottom-line real estate, it
becomes clear how important the deceitful rituals are to the salesmen. "It was great,"
Levene says in ecstasy. "It was like they wilted all at once.... They, I swear to God, they
both kind of imperceptibly slumped... It was so fucking solemn" (Ross 74). The only
way these salesmen can succeed is by ignoring honest means of doing business and
taking the rules into their own hands. Mamet argues, though, that the real people at
fault are the unseen Mitch and Murray, who have forced the salesmen to put aside
their morals throughout their careers in order to get ahead in the cutthroat business
world. Mitch and Murray's demagoguery represents an increasingly large influence on
society today, which has forced many businessmen, like the salesmen in this play, to
become dependent on old-fashioned and highly immoral rituals.

Mamet realizes the strong effect that myths have on all of American society. In his
collection of essays, Some Freaks, these myths have spread further; the entire nation
hides behind them. The essay "Corruption" comments on the Iran-Contra scandal
and President Reagan's involvement. "President Reagan said: The record seems to say
that I traded arms for hostages, but in my heart I did not" (Freaks 92). Reagan, thus,
positions himself above the rest of society, by allowing his heart's desire to rule a
nation. He has put his faith in common myths about the absolutism of power, and has
fallen victim to dangerous corruption. Mamet considers this to be "the ultimate
corruption, the megalomania brought about by power" (Freaks 92-93). Reagan's
inability to resist the temptations of power is not a rare phenomenon. Many others
have found themselves tracing similar patterns of corruption and placing their beliefs
in similar myths. Mamet compares Reagan's actions to those of corrupt parents who
create fear in a child only to provide themselves as the sole protection against it.
Reagan is, in effect, saying "If you want to remain a child, if you want to enjoy the
privilege of life without fear, do not judge me. If you deign to judge me, I will
withhold my protection" (Freaks 93). Our society has become irrevocably corrupted as
people accept without question the myth of absolute power. Many fail to recognize this
myth, even as they subscribe to it themselves: "We may have spanked children, or
humiliated students, or lied to those in our care-and while we were committing those
corrupt acts, may have assured ourselves that we were acting for some higher good,"
Mamet informs us (Freaks 94). In another essay, "Liberty," Mamet gives further reason
for America's moral decay. By refusing to provide aid to Central American Refugees
and to actively participate in other humanitarian causes, America is "resting on its
laurels" as a wise "Old Nation." "'We need not do good,' we are saying, 'because we are
good. Everybody loves us, and the things which we do are... good because we do
them'" (Freaks 105). As a result of withholding liberty, America has come to love
power instead. Mamet has carefully observed the decaying of the world as a result of
America's falling back on old myths of moral superiority and its refusal to take any
action to prove it: "We see the trappings of our age around us: an economy based on
waste, the moral and economic cost of maintaining a standing army, immigration
policies used as a political tool" (Freaks 106). As a nation, America must regain its love
of liberty, and become, once again, an important nation, and not merely a powerful
one.

All of Mamet's works show the use of these myths and rituals and their prevalence
throughout society. Mamet illustrates clearly to the reader the elaborate ways in which
people employ these systems of lies to avoid facing their personal shortcomings. In the
end, he suggests that only when the myths are put aside and people come face to face
at last with reality, can the problems of our society and the world begin to be solved.